Consuming Situations

Many people wonder why society is so divided, why when children enter high school they want to be part of the correct click, why there are many different “classes”, it is because we make it this way. People decided to create their own division, click, or class. However many things have set this into the mind of people, especially corporations. Part of big corporation jobs are to market their product to get consumers, but they over exaggerate with the marketing that it is causing addictions to people. These expenses are creating a huge problem for all of America, better yet for the whole world. People need to be aware of what really is going on. Corporations are only looking out for themselves and are using different tactics to persuade consumers to purchase their products. Corporations use emotions, the countercultural idea, and the division of class in order to persuade consumers to purchase their products. One thing that grabs attention is advertisement they are everywhere. Billboards, commercials, magazines, books, radios, music, and people even call your personal line to try to sell you a product. This is a problem because of the way these advertisements attack the audience, through their emotions. For example, Victoria Secret advertises their interior clothes by using skinny models and this not only sells their product but also affects people’s insecurity. In order for girls to look like the Victoria Secret model, they spend their money on weight loss products. In this example two unnecessary things where purchased, the interior clothes and the diet pills. Emotions play a big factor in advertisement and all corporations use this tactic because they want to persuade the consumers to consume. Corporations have taken the idea of being different or making a change to attract people to their products. as Thomas Frank states in his article "Commodify Your Dissent", "Corporations are using the countercultural idea from the BEats during the 1960's". Apple is a great example on this idea; they created a commercial in the late 1997 telling the people to Think Different. In this commercial Apple used well respected figures to help cause a greater impact like Mohandas Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Albert Einstein, and a couple of more. Nevertheless, why is it so important to portray these figures? People automatically think that Apple is trying to make a change like these people but how does Apple really compare to these great figures? The corporation does not; they are not changing racist views, non-violence acts, or created a theory of general reality. The corporations compare themselves to these figures because many of these figures followers will follow them. When people see advertisements like these they most likely purchase the products Divisions start because if you do not purchase brand named products you are considered cheap and from “low class”. When I was in middle school my group of friends would make fun of the girls who would wear Baby Phat. They would say that you buy those clothes in downtown, that it is a fake brand, and other mean stuff about it. It affected me because some of the kids they would make fun of where my friends and I could not stand someone making fun of me so I did not defend them. I also did not say anything because I bought clothes from downtown and I did not want to be considered low class. I did not realize that I was being a naïve kid. It was not until my junior year in high school that I realize that I should not have approached that situation the way I did. I realized that if you cannot afford it then one day, if you work hard enough, you will and there will not be a problem. Besides at the end of the day it is clothes and it covers you that is what counts, and it is the same with other products. These offenses begin with the innocent minds that grow up and continue their lives with the same attitude towards things. Children tease other children who are considered “low class” because they get this habit from the sources around them. Meaning parents, television programs, and quality of clothes or other stuff given to them. Children are learning from a young age the difference in quality, between the bootlegged Mickey that is sold in downtown and the Mickey that is sold in Disneyland. Essentially, they look the same, they are the same, but they are just two different prices. These brand labels or packages are affected in foods as well. For example, Oreos cookies are famously bought for children and if you go to a house and find that their cookies look exactly like Oreos but are named Great Value. The package is different looks a lot simpler and the guest automatically thinks that the person is cheap. It is sad how packaging is a very important part of the way Americanized people’s purchases. Thomas Hine states in his article What’s in a Package, “No marketplace in the world offers so many goods with such focused salesmanship as your neighborhood supermarket, where you are exposed to a thousand different products a minute. No wonder it is tiring to shop.” (pg119). With all these products presented to a shopper to have to make a decision without any consent but only the packaging, their few knowledge about the product, and most importantly the cost of the product. Families have to look for healthy foods but that are economically affordable and in most cases, they are not the expensive organic kinds of food. These decisions of having to choose between 7-up and Sprite or LaLa milk and Springfield milk are just ways of making it harder to decide what it is we should actually buy. It is nothing like the traditional marketplace where one stand has different products, not brands, and are personally telling you what it is for and why their product is a good choice to purchase. On the contrary, there are people who just cannot afford living for riches and goods, which makes it great that there is always at least two options to choose from, the organic and the affordable. There are people who are fashionist and it is just in their nature to buy expensive things because they can afford it at the moment and they want to live well. In a way, division in society is good to cause that ambition of wanting to be to the highest point of the pyramid. This causes people to work harder in society to become “high class”, it causes people to strive. It is a great way to motive and to active dreams and hopes that one day that person will live with riches. At the end of it all, motivation is being caused; however, after a while it causes addiction. The latest and greatest is only good for a couple of months then it is another product that causes a brighter affect. Even though society works as a circle, there is more consuming being done then money given to workers who in the end are consumers as well. I believe that this in the long term will cause a second Great Depression. People are wasting too much money on all the fancy stuff that has no importance and it is causing a horrible addiction. What will happen that one day that the consumers have consumed all that they could and have used all credit? What will the economy do then? It would be a catastrophe; it is important to bring awareness to people who are shopaholics. Purchasing is a great thing and is not bad once in awhile, unless a second Great Depression is what is wanted.